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Example research essay topic: Human Resources Department Competitive Environment - 2,191 words

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Does company T have a shared culture? Justify your answer with evidence from the case. Let us start from defining a shared culture. Culture, according to Websters college dictionary is a style of social expression peculiar to a class or society. Shared refers to taking part in, using or having in common.

We can conclude, therefore, that a shared culture is a commonly used style of social expression, which all the employees take part in. Looking at the case, it is clear that company T does have a shared culture. This culture is a typical macho culture, named 2 x 4 management. Employees aggressive behavior, constant fighting for a place under the sun, lying, stealing and cheating can characterize it. Even though some workers are embarrassed to tell about such a working environment their relatives and friends, they still are a part of it, and participate in it quite actively. Some do it because proving their superiority over others is a part of their personality, and others just want to survive among wolves.

In the case it says: Managers referred to the company culture as a jungle, the workers as animals, the extreme 2 x 4 type managers as monsters, and yet while many expressed aversion to the harsh style, others found it tough, honest, and hence, appealing. This culture was driven by fear. Everybody was afraid of his boss, and yet never missed his own chance to scream and yell at his employees. As one employee said: I dont think people listen to you if you are a nice guy. I dont think people listen to (the assistant plant manager) as much as they used to. People are scared of someone who chews them out.

Those who manage to be extremely rude and could abuse their co-workers especially skillfully were spoken of as something of folk heroes. Moreover, this perception the tougher the better is extended throughout the organization and people, whose macho is strong enough, are promoted much more often than their softer colleagues. Is Company T a strong culture? Macho, aggressive culture is really strong at company T.

It is strong because it influences just about every area of companys life. For example, such a generally positive thing as competition, which drives the productivity up and reinforces employees motivation, turned into a disease-like game. Both shifts were doing some ridiculous things such as locking up the tools so that the people on the other shift do not get them; sneaking in early to check whether the rivals were not working over time, etc. Such actions, however, were only directed to increasing quantity. Employees never had any concern for quality they were passing work from one department to another, never taking responsibility for their failures. It is obvious that the culture, which has put so much pressure on employees, caused such a situation.

This culture was strong enough to cause a tremendous change in the employees. They themselves admitted that the culture was quite anachronistic and distinct from the outer world. Perfectly normal people, who had families and friends, were turning into monsters once they entered the companys building. Only a strong environment is able to make people so different from who they are in larger culture. We are also talking about 1300 employees, who had different positions in the company, worked in different departments on different levels of management.

The culture was so strong in this company that it left no room for any exceptions from the rule. It affected everybody and anybody. All the employees of the company were using a whole vocabulary of terms, which appeared under the influence of the strong culture in the company. Some examples of this corporate vocabulary were shifts, a term that referred to competition between shifts, empire building lack of cooperation between functions, shipping shit passing poor quality products to another departments without taking the responsibility for the defects. Another strong effect, which the culture made on Company T was the appearance of lying, cheating and stealing.

Because people were afraid to admit their own mistakes, always wanted to win and never be retaliated in front of others, they needed to come up with a survival tactic. This tactic included hiding (stockpiling) parts, [] personnel and falsifying reports concerning injuries, defects and manpower. The next argument for this culture to be strong is that employees could not resist this culture even though they were totally aware of its negative influences (such as in a case of harmful competition, lying, cheating and stealing). If a corporate culture makes such damaging effects on the production process, it is not just strong, but extremely negatively strong. What are the problems of the culture? The main problem of the culture is obviously its failure to make the stay of all employees with this company comfortable and enjoyable.

One of the main attributes of this culture is fear. There are several forms that fear has taken in this organization. The first one, most common is the fear to be eaten by your manager in front of your coworkers. Along with the embarrassment that an employee felt, he / she realized the possible negative outcomes such as postponed promotion, rumors not only among coworkers but also in the other departments, lowering of your image as a tough guy.

There also is a fear of not delivering the numbers showing the nominal results of your work. As one employee said: Despite all the lip service about quality being most important, if you do not get the numbers, you get nothing. One can guess, therefore, that people are striving to show their management the numbers to get their pay and benefits. It is very hard for some people to do because of not having the feeling of comfort at their working place and because of the competition. The fear of being bet by someone else is the other type of fear in Company T.

This fear could be individual or team fear. Individually, each employee feared to be exposed and humiliated: Ive had it solid, with that 2 x 4 style, it nullifies you. You just start covering ass and playing your cards close to the vest. You collect a lot of excuses and you are ready to hand them out if anything comes up. So the problems never get solved. On a team level, people feared that their team would loose in production competition to the other one.

They did everything to not let it happen. As a consequence of constant fear, the employees worked out a special framework of surviving. They learnt how to deal with any situation, whether it was covering mistakes in their work or wiping out the tracks of their inappropriate, and even sometimes illegal behavior (e. g. stealing and concealing). The situation got quite bad and some employees started to perceive this framework of surviving, called lying, cheating and stealing as a part of their corporate culture, therefore a norm of behavior in the company.

All of the above, clearly enough, could not skip making impact on the production process. In a highly competitive environment, only those, who could impress their management by being tough or those who did something faster than others were recognized in this company. Another drawback in the culture of the Company T was functional loyalty, which can be defined as a broader empire building, lack of cooperation between functions. Both the entire departments and individuals were ready to pit themselves against other departments or other people. One employee notes: It was really incredible how one unit pits itself against another in this place. It is as if there is a wall at the end of each unit, and anything that passes through that wall is no longer a problem for that unit.

People pass things along because there is always pressure. 4. Can the problems in the culture be changed? A very strong, macho-style, aggressive culture was formed in the company T. There are numerous negative effects that the 2 x 4 management has made on the organization.

This culture, system of behavior that the employees share in this company, can and should be changed in order for the company to operate successfully in a very competitive environment that the company finds itself to be in. It seems that the informal organization in Company T is much stronger than the formal one. This means that the informal culture, in this case a very negative culture, influences the general well being of the company, its profitability, its production and operation processes. Even though, the Quality of Working Life programme was implemented two years ago, it brought almost no results. The weakness of the program was that it came from an external source (consultants), which did not actually know the culture from the inside, but only saw the visible effects it made on the organization. The corporation also failed to see that the cause of the problem of low quality was the organizational culture.

The QWL programme was directed at making technological and social transformations instead of working on changing the culture. One thing good about the programme, however, was that it functionally organized the plant. As it was also stated, the formal organization was weaker than the informal one, and the functional organization definitely somewhat strengthened the former one. Considering the effects the culture makes on the company, nevertheless, assigning functions and naming departments definitely was not enough to change things. The company really lacks an element that would be able to pass organizational goals to the employees, direct and redirect their activities in order to achieve those goals, taking personal need and wants of each employee into an account. Human Resources Department can be such a connecting element in Company T, especially in a plant that employees some 1300 people with numerous functions.

If a HR department existed in the company and were managed correctly, it could if not eliminate the negative effects of the present culture, than at least restrict them. The next question is whether the company should employ new people or leave the old personnel on their places. Both options can be implemented if there is a HR Department. The benefits of hiring new people are, of course, the fresh blood new people would not be spoilt by the current style of management and the plant would be able to built its corporate culture from scratch.

On the other hand, this can be very costly and time consuming for the company. Employing 1300 people is quite a challenge, especially taking into account the need for qualified technical staff. We know that the people who are currently employed by the plant appear to be very different in their regular lives. This means that they do have a potential to change and to accept a new culture in their work places. These people can be redirected and their attitudes changed. Those, who would not be able to accept the new Company T, should be terminated and new people hired.

However, in order to make such radical changes the company needs to set standards of behavior expected from the employees. Those standards should be written out and made known to everybody. Because some of the main problems in the company are shifts and empire building, a policy that would regulate this area should be established. This policy should contain the descriptions of both terms, consequences such actions would have and reward, which would be granted for not behaving in that way. Same actions would go for lying, cheating and stealing. The Human Resources department can take the responsibility for establishing and reinforcing such policies for the company.

Another function of the HR Department would be creation of favorable social atmosphere in the company. This could be organization of picnics, parties for employees and their families. If people spend some time together with their coworkers, they would not feel so competitive to them and would not feel good about humiliating their new friends. Informal communication between different levels of employees can help to reduce fear that is so common for the culture now. Because many of the Company Ts employees like the competitive environment they are in now, they can be offered to attend courses of wrestling, boxing, karate, etc. These courses would help them satisfy their aggression and let their energy out.

For the people who feel stress and fear at work, psychologist consultations can be provided. The company should cover all the expenses associated with these activities. As in any organization, one of the best tools to fight misunderstanding and any problems in general is talking to the employees. It can be worthwhile for the company to compose questionnaires asking employees opinions about the job they do, their opinion about the situation and whether they think it should be changed. Also, as the steps described above got implemented, employees should be asked what they think about the changes. There should be constant feedback and communication between management and employees.

Source: Adapted from Frances Westley (1990) The eye of the needle: Cultural and personal transformation in a traditional organization, Human Relations 43 (3), pp 273 - 93.


Free research essays on topics related to: competitive environment, negative effects, hr department, corporate culture, human resources department

Research essay sample on Human Resources Department Competitive Environment

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